Omni3D provides face shields to hospitals

The global COVID-19 virus pandemic is causing a shortage of necessary equipment in medical facilities. The widespread lack of personal protective equipment in hospitals affects not only isolation wards, but entire facilities. Omni3D supports hospitals in the fight against the virus by providing specially designed protective face shield for medical staff.

Omni3D is a Polish manufacturer of industrial 3D printers, which not only sells 3D printers, but also provides 3D printing services. The company has responded to the hospitals’ appeal for help in providing necessary protective equipment for medical staff during the fight against the epidemic. Within a few days, the company reorganised the work of its team, which is currently 100% involved in the project of printing elements for protective face shields.

Paweł Robak, CEO of Omni3D comments:

We decided to actively engage in helping hospitals and use the company’s potential as much as possible. As specialists in 3D printing, we have the necessary equipment, materials and, above all, a qualified team. We want to help medical staff because they save lives by risking theirs. Currently, together with Mentor S.A., we are actively looking for additional financial support, which will allow us to print thousands of pieces per month. In addition, we decided to share our design for free. It will be available from 03.04.2020 at www.omni3d.com.

The improved solution concerns a protective shield that is movable, which greatly improved the convenience of wearing this type of equipment for an extended period of time. Another difference is the design of the entire face shield in a way that allows its full decontamination, which allows the hospital to reuse it.

Krzysztof Kardach, Chief Technician at Omni3D explains:

In contrast to standard solutions, which has elastic material attached, we designed the attachment made of TPU-93A filament, which is also 3D printed. We print face shield parts in Factory 2.0 and Omni500 LITE using ABS-42 filament, thanks to which it is possible to increase the printing speed. People on forums mainly talk about printing using PET-G, because printers without a heated and closed chamber are most common. We don’t have this difficulty – adds the technician.

Omni3D delivered the first batch of face shields to hospitals, and they have passed the practical test. ER department staff, nurses and doctors in surgery departments have received the shields, among others.

Paweł Robak, CEO of Omni3D adds:

The hospital staff expressed appreciation and acceptance for our project. We have heard that the face shields are much better than those normally supplied to hospital staff.

Tomasz Banasiewicz, Head of the General, Endocrinological and Oncological Surgery Department at the Święcicki Hospital in Poznań, says:

Face shields help our employees stay safe every day, which is extremely important in this difficult time for all of us. The face shield design from Omni3D gives us additional comfort of use thanks to the raisable protective shield, and the materials used make it possible to carry out effective disinfection, which is a very valuable solution.

At present, 120 face shields are printed daily. Technicians are working on increasing the capacity to 150 units. The needs of hospitals are huge, and every bit of help is invaluable at the moment.

Everyone with a 3D printing capability and willingness to help those on the front line in the fight against the virus can download a free design from Omni3D’s website (www.omni3d.pl) and provide the highly needed equipment to hospitals.